99 ideas but you gotta pick just 1 🎲 #99

Issue 99 - crazy! That’s two years of sharing insights, adapting the format and content based on feedback and consistently publishing each week.

Now deep into January, I’m looking at what to pick up. My peers and influences would say start a podcast. I was briefly considering it.

After spraining my ankle trying to learn to skateboard, I had some time to understand what’s out there. I listened to many design podcasts and non-design podcasts. Few were floating my boat.

Part of the reason maybe that I don’t listen to podcasts. When I’m at work, I put my full effort into working towards outcomes. When I’m riding to the studio or needing a different zone, I put on some music (frequently new music).

But what I do enjoy learning from is video. Right now that’s Instagram Stories (morning and lunchtimes) and YouTube (evenings).

Another thing to bear in mind is idea and execution and that ideas are just a multipler of execution. More info on that here. You can have an ok-ish idea, executive it very well and you’ll win. You can have an amazing idea, execute it badly, and it won’t do so well.

Gives me food for thought that.

Thanks for supporting this issue,

- Ross

ps. Next issue is #100. I feel like another change is due. What do you want to see, what do you want to keep and what do you want to drop from these weekly digests? Reply to this email and let me know!

This UI/UX case study documents the processes involved in a redesign of a fashion retail and e-commerce app. They used a 11 day design sprint, including something we did on a recent project - a field study.

The classic startup founder story is that they were living their lives innocently enough and one day they realised that they were faced with a huge personal problem that was incredibly important to solve. So they dedicated their lives to fixing it, as a heroic quest.And that’s a nice story. But it’s also kind of a pointless one.

My thoughts on this are that you should try things that you might like or are good at, and gently narrow your field. That doesn’t mean to say you can’t be good at others things, but as the story says “without focus, there is no such thing as skill.”

ROI is an industrial age term, applicable to companies that manufacture things in factories. That era is now over.

In every project kickoff, I ask “how are we going to measure that we’re doing a good job.” It’s the simplist I can put any form of KPI or success metrics. Normally it is met with silence! If you’re interested in ROI not being a measure, also google NPS - that’s not accurate either!